I am taking or have taken courses at my local community college- will those credits be transferable?

No. Dartmouth does not grant course credits for classes taken at 2 year vocational or community colleges except in rare cases.

It is possible that your courses may be used for placement purposes i.e. if you have taken College level math, you may take a placement test to move into a more advanced class. You will not receive credit for the level you skipped.

The granting of credits is done on a case to case basis by individual departments. (Check out the government department's policy here.) We have a rather strict policy on accepting transfer credits because our faculty will grant credits only if coursework taken at another college or university matches up directly with Dartmouth curriculum.

Do Admissions Officers Check A Student's Facebook/MySpace profile?

These days, we receive many questions from students regarding their online social profiles. Since anything published online is public information, technically we reserve the right to use any public internet information regarding your candidacy to make admissions decisions.
Truthfully, however, the Dartmouth Admissions Office does not actively "research" candidates online, unless there are circumstances which would validate or confirm a student's candidacy. (For example, we might confirm awards granted in a particular science fair, in order to get a sense of a student's accomplishments at the local, regional, state, or national level.) Sometimes the web can be a helpful tool in understanding the context or community of a particular applicant.

The bottom line is that it is smart to represent yourself professionally on the web. We're not trying to use the web as a "spy" tool. However, social media sites ARE a representation of yourself, and hopefully you would want to put your best foot forward.

Should I fill out the International Supplement?

If you are...

* Not a US citizen but have attended a US high school since 9th grade, you do NOT have to fill out the International Supplement.

* Not a US citizen and transferred from a high school abroad into a US high school during 10th, 11th or 12th grade, you DO have to fill out the International Supplement.

* A US citizen and attend an international school abroad, you DO have to fill out the International Supplement.

As a rule of thumb, if you have attended a secondary school (high school) that is not in the US, you should send in the supplement with your other application materials.

When is the best time to visit the Dartmouth campus?

The best times to visit are generally the summer and early fall. April and July through October are our busiest months for visitors. Thus, these are also the months when we have the most available programming in the Admissions Office- we offer campus tours, information sessions conducted by Admissions Officers as well as student forums with our Admissions Interns.

* Please visit our RSVP calendar for details: http://www.dartmouth.edu/apply/visiting/calendar/display.html#

* If you are visiting during the summer, classes will be in session for the sophomore class starting from the end of June through the middle of August so you will get to see the campus in full swing.

* If you are visiting during the fall, you will be able to sit in on a class. This option is NOT available in the summer due to high visitor volume and small summer class sizes.

* If you'd like to come when it's less busy, February, May, June and November may be good times for you!

I'm applying for Transfer admission. Do I need to submit the Common Application's Secondary School Report?

No, but...

Your school does not need to submit the Secondary School Report from the Common Application, but we will need your secondary school to submit your transcript. For most applicants, the Common Application's Secondary School Report is the most sensible vehicle for the transcript, but if using this form would pose a challenge for your secondary school, we can accept an official transcript from your school without this form. Similarly, if your secondary school guidance counselor is not able to complete all portions of the Secondary School Report, it is fine if he/she submits a partially completed report along with your transcript.

I am planning to apply for Transfer Admission. When should I send in my materials?

Our Transfer application deadline is March 1.

Some students send in their application materials during the fall, but for the most part people submit their materials to us during the month of February.

For more info, have a look here.

I haven't been contacted for an interview. How do I request one?

You cannot request an interview.

The Admissions Office forwards applicant contact information to volunteer alumni interviewers throughout the US and abroad. Our alumni then seek to contact as many applicants as possible to invite them to interview. With a wide alumnus/a to student ratio, however, we will be unable to offer interviews to many of our applicants.

For more info, see this page, or have a look at the related posts.

Do my Teacher Recommendations have to come from a junior or senior year teacher?

No.

However, the two required teacher recommendations should come from teachers who know you well at the time you apply. A 9th or 10th grade teacher would be acceptable so long as that teacher knows you well currently and can write about you as a student today and not simply how you were several years ago in his or her class.

What does it mean when an application is "deferred" during Early Decision?

Applications that are deferred at the end of Early Decision are reviewed again during Regular Decision. Early Decision applications will receive one of three replies - acceptance to the Class of 2014, deferral to Regular Decision Review or denial of the candidacy for admission for this year.

The Admission Committee defers the final review of a candidacy to Regular Decision when additional information (senior year grades, more recent test results, etc.) will help us better understand the applicant's potential or when reviewing the case in the context of the larger Regular Decision applicant pool will provide a more complete picture of where the applicant "fits" in Dartmouth's applicant pool.

While the Admissions Committee does not set a specific target for the number of deferrals in Early Decision, in recent years similar numbers of candidates have received deferral notices and deny notices at the end of Early Decision.

What should I do if I am a U.S. Military Veteran applying to Dartmouth?

Common Application
United States Military Veterans applying to Dartmouth should use the Common Application to summarize their academic and work histories and to highlight activities and interests outside of employment and formal educational settings. Detailed explanations of unique circumstances can be included in the “Additional Information” section of the Common Application First-Year Application or Transfer Application.

Academic Record
We understand that an applicant’s military service can result in gaps in educational enrollment and that many veterans will pursue part-time or online enrollment in college course work during their service. While some military veterans find that their academic record prior to serving in the military is no longer an accurate reflection of their academic abilities, Dartmouth still requires the submission of all secondary school and college or university transcripts with an application for admission.

The Admissions Committee works hard to review each application on its own individual merits, accounting for the context of the applicant’s experiences and the time elapsed since earning the grades represented in one’s application.

Veterans who have been away from high school or college course work for more than two years are encouraged to enroll in college courses prior to applying to Dartmouth. Recent and successful completion of challenging academic course work will provide the Admissions Committee with relevant evidence of a candidate’s academic ability. The Admissions Committee assigns great value to the personal qualities and characteristics gained through military service, but application readers also look to recently completed academic course work as tangible evidence of a candidate’s potential for success at Dartmouth.

Transfer vs. First Year Application
Veterans who have been enrolled in college or university course work may have the choice between applying to Dartmouth as a transfer applicant or a first-year applicant, depending on the number of courses they have pursued at the post-secondary level. If you have earned more than one year of college credit, you will likely want to apply to Dartmouth as a transfer applicant.

Course Credits
Because the Dartmouth faculty evaluates each individual course taken by an enrolling student before awarding credit, it can be difficult to predict how many courses taken at another college or university will count towards a Dartmouth degree.

While the Dartmouth faculty does not typically award credit for courses taken at two-year or community colleges, veterans may receive credit for these courses once the syllabi have been reviewed by department faculty. Dartmouth does not grant credit for online course work.

When will I be notified of my admissions decision if I've applied Early Decision?

We will notify candidates of their decisions in the middle of December. The week before decisions are released, we will send you an e-mail to let you now that we are in the final stages of our decision making process.

If I have already submitted my application, can I add more information to my file later?

Yes, but only if necessary.

Please understand that submitting more materials is not necessarily very helpful. We encourage you to submit substantive updates (for instance, major accomplishments that occur after you have submitted your application), but you should submit extra materials only if it contains new information that will add significantly to our understanding of your candidacy.

If one of my recommendations isn't sent until after the deadline, will you still review my application?

Yes. If a letter or recommendation or other piece of your application arrives after the deadline we will still do our best to read your application.

Please do your best to get us all required materials as close to the deadline as possible. If we do not have everything we need to review your file, you will receive an email from the Admissions Office (after all materials we have are processed) notifying you of what we need.

Please do not call our office to check what materials we have received. Instead, please just use the online applicant system. Most importantly, please be patient as we process the thousands of materials we receive.

I missed the chat. Is it posted online somwhere?

Yes.

You can find it on the ustream.tv web site here.

November 1 is a Sunday this year. Can I submit my material on November 2 instead?

Yes.

Two quick points:

1) Our deadline is a postmark deadline. In other words, it is a date by which material must be submitted (see my earlier post for specifics of what must be submitted) not a date by which material must be received.

2) If you're planning to mail material to us and can't get to a post office on Saturday, or if you're in a pinch and need to see your guidance counselor (and, of course, won't be able to see him/her over the weekend) it is okay to wait to submit your material until November 2.

Can the CSS Profile be replaced by the Foreign Student Financial Aid Profile?

If you are able to submit the CSS Profile then that is the form you are required to submit. We are well aware that in some circumstances and in some countries the CSS Profile is not possible.

We are using the College Scholarship Service PROFILE Form to collect accurate, consistent information and to minimize the possibility for data entry errors.

If the cost associated with the PROFILE Form is going to present a significant financial burden for your family, you may request permission to use an alternative form. Please send an email to Financial.Aid@Dartmouth.EDU that provides the following information:

• Your country of residency
• The number of family members who live in your parents' household
• Your family's total 2009 income from all sources in US dollars
• The equity (value minus debt) of your family's assets in US dollars
• The exchange rate that you used to convert your currency to US dollars

We will review the information and respond to you by email.

Please visit the Financial Aid International Applicant web page for more information.

When will I be contacted for an interview?

Depends when you get your application materials submitted and when our alumni can interview you.

For Early Decision, you will be contacted by mid-November if the local alumni are able to offer you an interview.

For Regular Decision, you will be contacted by mid-February if the local alumni are able to offer you an interview.

Please do not call the Admissions Office (or our alumni) about an interview. Dartmouth alumni in your area will contact you directly if they are able to offer you an interview. We do not offer on-campus interviews.

What if I don't get contacted for an interview?

Don't worry about it.

Our wonderful volunteer alumni interviews do their very best to interview every candidate possible, but given the volume of applications, they are simply unable to interview every applicant. About half of our applicants get interviewed. If you are not contacted about an interview, all it means is that the alumni in your community could not get to you.

The interview is optional and provides for one more way for the admissions committee to get to know you. The interview is also a great time for you to learn more about the College from Dartmouth alumni. There is no reason to stress about the interview or worry that you weren't contacted for one.

There is no way to request an interview. All the applicant needs to do is submit her/his application materials to Dartmouth Admissions and we will pass along the contact information to alumni in the applicant's area.

Please do not call the Admissions Office to request an interview. Also, we do not offer on-campus interviews.

Can I and should I submit additional letters of recommendation, beyond the required 2 teacher recs, peer eval, and counselor rec?

Can you? Yes. Should you? Depends.

You may submit additional recommendations and we will consider them as we review your file. However, additional recommendations should be submitted only if they will add new and relevant information to our understanding of you.

If you are considering submitting additional recommendations, they should only come from individuals who know you in different and meaningful ways from your other recommendation-writers. There is a difference between a helpful recommendation and a positive recommendation. Essentially every recommendation we receive is positive; however, often times extra recs may not be helpful because they only reiterate points we already know.

Is there any specific prompt for the Personal Statement?

No, not exactly. The Common App proposes the following topics and any of them are fine (including a "Topic of your choice"):

• Discuss some issue of personal, local, national, or international concern and its importance to you.
• Indicate a person who has had a significant influence on you, and describe that influence.
• Describe a character in fiction, a historical figure, or a creative work (as in art, music, science, etc.) that has had an influence on you, and explain that influence.
• A range of academic interests, personal perspectives, and life experiences adds much to the educational mix. Given your personal background, describe an experience that illustrates what you would bring to the diversity in a college community, or an encounter that demonstrated the importance of diversity to you.
• Topic of your choice.

My advice to you is to make sure that whatever your topic, your writing style and content is personal. Everything you say should help the readers of your file get to know you as real person, especially those intangible qualities that can't be easily understood elsewhere, including creativity, leadership, sense of humor, passion, compassion, intellectual curiosity, self-awareness, social-awareness, and more. Your personal statement is not just an essay or writing sample, it's our way of getting to know you and what you'll bring to Dartmouth.